A study conducted by a team of 71 researchers from 12 countries revealed potentially large influences of fungi, among the most biologically diverse classes of organisms, on energy supplies. Hear more in this Discovery Files podcast.
Credit: NSF/Karson Productions

What if wastewater could be turned into energy? It almost sounds too good to be true, but environmental engineer Bruce Logan is working on ways to make it happen. Most wastewater treatment plants already use bacteria to break down the organic waste in the water. Logan and his team at Penn State University are developing microbial fuel cells to channel the bacteria's hard work into energy. See more in this Science Nation video.
Credit: Science Nation, National Science Foundation

University of Wisconsin-Madison bacteriologist Cameron Currie and his team study ants and their complex, productive societies to help address some of human society's most pressing challenges, such as better drugs and cleaner energy. Leaf-cutter ants may have been the planet's first farmers. The insects chew up the leaves they cut and integrate them into a fungus garden, which then becomes both their food and their living space. See more in this Science Nation video.
Credit: Science Nation, National Science Foundation

The Office of Emerging Frontiers in Research and Innovation (EFRI) of NSF's Engineering Directorate (ENG) serves a critical role in helping ENG focus on important emerging areas in a timely manner. Each year, EFRI will recommend, prioritize and fund interdisciplinary initiatives at the emerging frontier of engineering research and education.

With NSF support, Amy Rosenzweig's group seeks to understand the cellular machinery that enable certain bacteria to leach copper out of the environment and metabolize methane.

September 23, 2013

One day, we may fill the tank with fungi fuel!

Plant fungi and bacteria called "endophytes" fueling breakthroughs in energy, medicine and more

Over his 50-year career, Montana State University plant pathologist Gary Strobel has traveled to all seven continents to collect samples of endophytes from remote and sometimes dangerous places. Endophytes are microorganisms--bacteria and fungi--that live within the living tissue of a plant.

With support from the National Science Foundation (NSF), Strobel, engineer Brent Peyton and their team at Montana State University have discovered that endophytes have the ability to make diesel-like fuel. One hydrocarbon-producing fungus comes from the Ulmo tree of Patagonia. Another is a citrus fungus from Florida. And, amazingly, it takes the team just a few weeks to create the fuel.

Strobel says the long-term goal is to improve the process of using microbes that degrade plant material, especially agricultural waste, to make economically feasible quantities of hydrocarbons. He adds fungi and bacteria hold great potential for breakthroughs in medicine, plastics and green chemistry as well.

The research in this episode was supported by NSF award #0937613 and funded through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009.

Any opinions, findings, conclusions or recommendations presented in this material are only those of the presenter grantee/researcher, author, or agency employee; and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation.